Something Special Inside

There was once a huge walnut desk in the Old Executive Office Building in Washington, D.C., the structure where Vice President Cheney has most of his offices. It has been said that, long ago, the desk was used by American presidents, but when it became sufficiently damaged, it was passed on to vice presidents.

The desk was not a bit dilapidated. It was buffed and shined, and it was surrounded by priceless knick-knacks in a ballroom-size office the vice president uses for entertaining. But neither the shine nor the surroundings could hide the hundreds of small dents and scratches that marred every surface of this historic desk.

But there was more to this desk than a marred surface. This desk held a secret deep inside it - a peculiar, somewhat charming secret. In the main drawer - the one right in front of you when you sit down, the wide flat drawer where you keep pens and pencils - were the signatures of all the vice presidents who had ever sat at that desk: Harry Truman, Herbert Humphrey, Richard Nixon, and the rest. Dan Quayle's name was carved deeply into the wood with a pen knife.

Marred surface, something special and sweet and childlike deep inside.... Sounds like a lot of people in this world, don't you think?

Robert Epstein, Ph.D., Host of "Psyched!"